Impressions by Joe Helle
September, 1981. On Saturday morning Henrietta and I traveled by train from Frankfurt down the Rhine Valley to Dortmund. Fritz was to meet us at the depot waving a white flag. I can still see Fritz and his flag! His son, Dietmar, was along to drive and act as translator. Dietmar is a school teacher and speaks very good English. On the way to Ruethen, ancestral home of the Helle Clan, we stopped off at Soest. A dam knocked out there in World War II by a British aviator did much damage in the valley below.
We enjoyed Dietmar and his son, Jendrik, a very well adjusted child of four at the time. I never heard Dietmar tell Jendrik he was a bad boy, but that he did not like what he was doing. Jendrik's mother is a medical doctor. Next year they will take time off to get a girl. We shall see. I hope they get their girl. (They did!) In my family five boys before a girl showed up then five more boys before two more girls arrived.
Fritz is a very fine and able gentleman. I was very favorably impressed with Fritz, his wife, Leni, sons Wolfgang and Diet-mar and those grandsons we met -- Jendrik, Markus and RaIf. I decided Grandfather Fred Helle left a lot of talent behind when he immigrated to Central Illinois.
Fritz, now retired, was a brewmaster for twenty years. Now a brewmaster is way up on the totem pole along with the mayor and other big wigs of the town. There seems to be a caste system in Europe. That we left behind or outgrew.
Fritz told us in his broken English some of his experiences in World War II. At the end of the war he was between Russian and American lines. He shed his uniform and headed back to the American troops. After four days hiding out, the Amiericans found him. Since he appeared to be a civilian, they gave him a job and put him to work. Leni lost three brothers and a brother - in - law during World War II. (Fritz also lost his youngest brother.)
In my conversations with Dietmar, a very astute scholar, we would agree, one of the great mistakes of history was the partitioning of Germany. I recalled listening to a radio report of Hitler telling his troops, "The future of Germany for the next 100 years is on your shoulders." How right he was.
We left the Helles and Ruethen about 2:00 p.m. on Monday. When our European tour of four weeks ended, it was good to put our feet on American soil again. However, it would be nice to again visit those friendly folks we left behind.
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